When it came, Donald Trump’s reelection to the White House as anarchist in chief wasn’t unexpected. But the scale of his victory – and just how quickly the result was declared – was a surprise. No wonder markets scrambled to recalibrate in the hours that followed. The morning in London after the night before saw [...]
politics
What caught our eye this week. Hello campers, TA here – standing in for TI, who’s off on his annual hols this week. That means topping up his monitor tan in some seedy foreign hotel instead of his seedy London lair. Ah well, a change is as good as rest as they say. Right, with [...]
The Tory win is great for those of us with wealth, but it does raise question marks about the future and Brexit still looms large…
A new tool makes it easy to see how (little) it costs us directly to be in the EU, plus the rest of the week’s reads…
Has the world become too risky for passive investors with Donald Trump as president? Lars Kroijer says it’s more complicated than that…
Who should get your vote, from a purely selfish personal finance and investing point of view?
A rant about Mrs Thatcher. Sorry if it offends, I know many of you hate her. That’s sort of the point.
Britain looks set for more years of slog, but our corporate sector should do much better, and besides, shares look cheap.
What do you think? Will you be taking popcorn into the cinema to see The Iron Lady come January – or sneaking in a bag of rotten tomatoes?
What is naked short selling, and why is it so unpopular in Germany, the home of the nudist? (Oh I see! Not that kind of naked…)
Britain has a new coalition government that looks set to tackle the deficit. But how much will you have to pay for Labour’s previous largesse?
There’s a tough job that needs doing, and Brown’s selfish obfuscation has made it even tougher for whoever comes next.
Congratulations, you’re paying more income tax this year to fund profligate public spending. If this is news to you, you’re not alone.
Vince Cable, Alistair Darling, and George Osborne go head-to-head in the Twister session from hell. Who won?
Will somebody in Conservative HQ please turn on the lights? The UK electorate badly needs a clue, but not as much as its politicians.
A very young Tony Blair’s verdict on the 1987 crash sounds uncannily applicable to the 2007-2009 turmoil, too.
The 2009 pre-budget report was certainly painful, but instead of surgically precise spending cuts and tax lifts, we got clumsy bloodletting.
The UK’s next Prime Minister will inherit a country spending way beyond its means, and as deep in denial as any spendaholic
People with an anti free trade agenda are going to try to hijack the financial crisis to increase regulation elsewhere.
A couple of readers have asked me what I think about the MPs’ expenses scandal that’s turned the British Isles into a Banana Republic. My first thought is Banana Republic politics is rather fitting for the UK today, given our dire national finances, unelected leader and last week’s threat to our debt’s AAA status. Beyond [...]
I had a lot of fun today covering the UK Budget over on the Monevator Twitter channel. It was fun racing other finance bloggers and the bloke who does the BBC captions to announce the news. There were two occasions though when I was late with my updates. Both times it was because I was [...]
Honestly, I despair. The day before the UK Government unveils a second banking rescue package worth hundreds of billions of pounds and RBS (once one of the world’s largest banks) falls 67% to become a penny stock, the Conservative party apparatus circulates a press release concerning… Value Added Tax in a Government gift shop. On [...]
Last night Alastair Darling, the UK Chancellor, guaranteed 100% of savings in Northern Rock – and indeed the Financial Services Authority has since gone further, stating this guarantee extends to other troubled financial institutions that might emerge in coming days. Given the scenes we’ve witnessed since Thursday’s news that Northern Rock required a lifeline from [...]